92 
ENDOSPORE^. 
[diach^a. 
stout, conical, or shortly cylindrical, densely charged with orange 
lime-granules. Capillitium radiating from all parts of the 
columella, composed of rather rigid violet-brown threads, branch- 
ing and anastomosing, tapering to the hyaline extremities. Spores 
olive-coloured, marked with small scattered warts, and four to 
eight prominences, each of which a high magnifying power resolves 
into a compact cluster of minute warts, 9 to 11 /a diam. 
Plate XXXVI., B. — a. sporangia, x 20 ; J. capillitium and spores, x 280 ; 
c. spores, x 600 (North Carolina, U. S.A.) ; d. sporangia, x 20 ; e. columella 
and capillitium, x 50 ; /. spore, x 600 (Killary, U.S.A.). 
The specimen figured (Plate XXXVI., B, d-f) was received from 
Prof. Farlow, and is part of a gathering by Prof. Thaxter, Killery, 
U.S.A. The sporangia are sessile, subcylindrical, crowded and some- 
what angled by mutual pressure, iridescent, rising from an opaque 
oehraceous common hypothallus, which extends into a membranous 
pellicle ; the sporangium-wall is persistent, membranous, hyaline or 
dull purple at the base ; the columella is a narrow, membranous, 
wrinkled tube, dirty oehraceous or brown, I'eaching nearly to the apex 
of the sporangium, empty above, with scanty deposits of lime some- 
times present in the lower part ; the capillitium and spores are as in 
D. Thomasii. Prof. Farlow has gathered this form more than once, 
growing in tufts, on moss, always in poor condition, but with the 
oehraceous hypothallus, narrow columella, and capillitium and spores 
similar to those in the gathering by Prof. Thaxter. A portion of 
Prof. Thaxter' s specimen was submitted to Dr. Rex, who states that 
it is the same species as one described by Dr. Sturgis as Comatricha 
ccespitosa n. sp. in Bot. Gazette, xviii., p. 186 (1893). The mem- 
branous ^columella almost free from lime, resembhng some Ceylon 
specimens of D. elegans, and the opaque oehraceous hypothallus, mark 
the species as distinct from any of the Steraonitacece ; on the other 
hand, it so closely resembles D. Thomasii that it appears to be a form 
of that species, though less perfectly developed than the type. 
Hah. On bark and moss.— N. Carolina (L:B.M.70). 
SPECIES NOT MET WITH IN THE QUOTED COLLECTIONS. 
4. D. subsessilis Peck, E,ep. N. York Mus. Nat. Hist., xxxi., 
p. 41. Sporangia gregarious or crowded, subglobose, sessile or 
with very short white stalks; sporangium-wall delicate, iridescent; 
columella obsolete ; capillitium and spores violet -brown ; spores 
globose, rough, 10 to 12 ^ diam. 
Hah. On fallen leaves. — Adirondack Mts., N.Y, 
The spores of this species, according to Dr. Rex, are marked with 
diffusely branched rows of minute papillae, ranged side by side in a 
moniliform manner, and forming either a complete or broken reticu- 
lation. (See Rex, in Proc. Acad. N. Sc. Phil., 1893, p. 368.) 
SPECIES EXCLUDED FROM THE GENUS. 
Diachcea Hookeri Mass. = Chondrioderma Hooke^'i List. 
